From pycyn@aol.com Wed Apr 12 09:14:11 2000 Return-Path: Received: (qmail 28841 invoked from network); 12 Apr 2000 16:14:11 -0000 Received: from unknown (10.1.10.27) by m1.onelist.org with QMQP; 12 Apr 2000 16:14:11 -0000 Received: from unknown (HELO imo-d02.mx.aol.com) (205.188.157.34) by mta2 with SMTP; 12 Apr 2000 16:14:11 -0000 Received: from Pycyn@aol.com by imo-d02.mx.aol.com (mail_out_v25.3.) id h.e0.30b4520 (4357) for ; Wed, 12 Apr 2000 12:14:08 -0400 (EDT) Message-ID: Date: Wed, 12 Apr 2000 12:14:08 EDT Subject: RECORD: staple gismu ("buckwheat") To: lojban@onelist.com MIME-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset="US-ASCII" Content-Transfer-Encoding: 7bit X-Mailer: AOL 4.0 for Windows sub 33 X-eGroups-From: Pycyn@aol.com From: pycyn@aol.com Lojban words for staples are to be used in the broadest useful sense, with more specific sense done by either compounds or context. The examples given are all of genera or family in the biologic sense (buckwheat-sorrel-rhubarb, taro-manioc-yam). But clearly other extensions are also intended. I think that the lojban word for potato (palto in my old list) covers both potatoes, a kind of nightshade shrub, and sweet potatoes, a kind of morningglory vine, with no useful biological connections. rismi (or whatever) covers both rice and wild rice and I don't think the latter is even graminacious. I suspect there are other cases where function or look or perhaps (as in these cases) English has pointed to the range of understanding (peanuts are more peas than nuts biologically, and cashews are apples, not oaks). Maybe we need some specifications within the dictionary on how these are to be spread -- more than just the (as in the case of "buckwheat") initally obscure list of cases. I also wonder what about the reverse cases, where a single species covers a variety of things -- Brassica oleoracea springs to mind (cabbage, kale, kohlrabi, cauliflower, broccoli, Brussel sprouts, and I think some oriental veggies as well -- more diverse than Canis familiaris).